While briefly visiting Aurian Redson’s blog earlier this week I was tickled to find that he contributed to this cool website which I had never heard of! It is called illostribute and their tagline is “investigation through interpretation” – that’s a pretty nifty and simple premise and I love the idea that artists explore and are inspired by a variety of sources, I think it will help expose new fans to these “old” favorites too. I am often surprised by how artists don’t know anything about the history of “style” they adopt as their own and perhaps were subliminally (?) inspired by in their childhoods.

This specific assignment by illostribute, I came across on Aurian’s site, was explore the essence of the work of Mary Blair. I love Mary Blair! Her work is so fun, funky and simply adorable. It’s happy and angular and so totally of the era. The background info on Ms. Blair, written by illostribute, was comprehensive and interesting. This type of scholarly respect is all too often missing online. Kudos to you guys, I will be sure to pop back to your site when I get time!

Aurian’s contribution to this project is as sweet and original as can be. I couldn’t be more proud to have had him do the illustrations for Bear and Bird, here on this site and more fun stuff to come! Check out both his site and illostribute for some lovely things. -Amanda